Führerbunker

Führerbunker is the name given to the bunker or antiaircraft shelter located in the underground of Berlin , designed to protect the high command of the State and the armed forces of Nazi Germany during World War II .

History

The nerve center of the German state, centered in the Chancellery of the Reich , counted from the outset with a series of antiaircraft shelters located in the subsoil. The first bunkers were built in 1936, behind the gardens of the Old Chancellery, being erected by the construction company Hochtief (founded in 1873).

After the arrival of Adolf Hitler to the power in 1933, the New Chancellery that had been designed by the architect Albert Speer was planned and constructed , taking advantage of the works to construct new refuges that began in 1943.

The bunker was used during the last moments of the war by Hitler (hence its name Führerbunker ), who moved there on January 16, 1945, after seeing how the continuous air attacks had made the stay inside the dangerous New Chancellery .

According to accounts of the survivors, Adolf Hitler, after being informed that the armed forces that had to liberate to Berlin had surrendered before the Soviets, ordered to call a judicial official to make official his wedding with Eva Braun, after which it committed suicide next To his wife . Apparently his remains and those of his wife were taken to the chancery garden and set on fire to prevent the Russians from being able to capture them. The bunker was finally taken over by Soviet forces on May 2.

Ruins of the bunker emergency exit after its demolition in 1947.

After the war, the remains of the bunker remained forgotten for years and half-buried in an adjacent wasteland block where the Reichstag existed, with the ante-bunker being demolished by the East German authorities , at least partially, in 1988 to build apartments over them.

In May 1995 the regional parliament of Berlin decided to close the Führerbunker to build new homes, [ citation needed ] rejecting the proposal of the party Alliance ’90 / The Greens requesting the permanence of the place as a historical monument, [ citation needed ] although it is possible That the rooms of the last floor, the deepest, remain intact still protected by the 3 meters of concrete of the ceiling.

The bunker, or what remains of it (penultimate and last level) today is under a square and has been tested its location with sonic waves. The divisions are shown in the attached chart.

Features

The shelter, deeper than its predecessor and called Vorbunker or antebunker, was built at greater depth (about 8.2 meters), but interconnected with that by stairs.

On the ground floor were the rooms and offices of Hitler and his wife Eva Braun , as well as the conference room, Joseph Goebbels ‘ bedroom, the doctors’ room, restrooms and auxiliary and auxiliary rooms.

The Führerbunker had two entrances: one facing the old bunker of the Chancellery and the other leading to the garden, which was accessed by climbing up a spiral staircase to an observation tower, or exiting through an adjoining building.

As the construction was under the water table , it was necessary that the pumps intended to evacuate the water were continuously running, so that the atmosphere inside the refuge (which was already very austere following Hitler’s directives) was acoustically Rarefied, since it also had electric generators .

The access to the bunker was very controlled and no one was allowed to enter armed to it. The ventilation was also very protected, since it was feared that a gas attack could affect the occupants, so that there were watertight doors that protected against this type of chemical attack.

The roof and walls of the refuge were 4 meters thick; he resisted, without suffering any harm, [ citation needed ] Soviet bombardments of the last hours of the war, as the Soviets had no record of the location of it, and it was not until the last moment when they learned of their existence, Which meant an increase in the intensity of the cannon.